HYPERICACEAE (ST. JOHN’S-WORT FAMILY) 285 
an inch long, light green, sessile, more or less black-dotted and 
specked all over with pellucid dots. Flowers in terminal cymose 
clusters, very showy; petals five, golden yellow, nearly a half- 
inch long, with black-dotted margins; stamens many, separated 
into three groups, their anthers black-dotted; styles three, di- 
vergent; calyx of five lance-shaped, acute sepals, specked with 
pellucid dots. Capsule ovoid, three-celled, filled with small, 
rounded, oblong seeds, their surface delicately pitted in rows. 
Too often an impurity among grass seeds. 
Means of control 
The plant is best destroyed by hand-pulling when the soil is 
sufficiently soft to slacken its hold on the long, woody roots. Or 
it may be grubbed out, care being taken to leave no stray runners. 
A meadow or a pasture too rankly infested to be so cleansed should 
be turned under and put to a well-tilled hoed crop. 
\ 
SHRUBBY ST. JOHN’S-WORT 
Hypericum prolificum, L 
Native. Perennial. Propagates by seeds. 
Time of bloom: July to September. 
Seed-time: August to October. 
Range: New Jersey to Southern Ontario and Minnesota, south- 
ward to Georgia and Arkansas. 
Habitat: Dry soil; sandy fields, rocky upland pastures, waste 
places. 
A very beautiful and ornamental plant, provided -it might be 
restricted to a corner of a flower garden. Stems one to four feet 
tall, strong and woody, branching near the base, the branches 
ascending, the branchlets with side-ridges making them two-edged. 
Leaves two to three inches in length, pellucid dotted, narrowly 
oblong, obtuse, tapering toward the base, the lower ones with 
short petioles, those near the top sessile; in the axils are usually 
tufts of smaller leaves. Flowers bright yellow, each nearly an 
inch broad, in terminal and axillary clusters, very numerous; 
sepals unequal, shorter than the petals; stamens very numerous, 
